The Angel and The Mujahid
by MJTR
Summary: Two warriors, from different cities, of different faiths and wielding different abilities, are brought together to save Jersey City from destruction at the hands of a gang of Inhumans.
1. Chapter 1

The Angel and The Mujahid

A Fan Fiction by MJTR

[[Crossover related info, because I put way too much thought into how this stuff works:

This fic functions on the basic rules semi-established by DC and Marvel for their cross-overs. The Marvel and DC universes periodically see some small-scale merging. History is all intact, though some memories might be slightly altered. The universes will unjoin once the messes within them are cleaned up, blah blah blah. I like to write in Original Flavor, I like to play by pre-established rules.

This fic is in the same slightly altered continuity as my previous story, _Angel of the Bat_. I'll knock a brief synopsis of that out in this chapter, so you don't need to read it beforehand. It also acts as a sort of replacement for the _Crushed_ arc in _Ms. Marvel_. We'll get there when we get there.

No comment on what year this takes place. Trying to figure that out just doesn't work for me.

Okay, think that covers it. Let's have some fun.]]

…

She looked herself up and down for what would well have been the hundredth time, chewing on her bottom lip nervously and trying to figure out what she was doing wrong. She had seen everyone else dressed up like this, at some point or another. Barbara looked great, Stephanie looked great, Sadie had looked stunning. So what was she doing wrong?

"I hate dresses," Cassandra said under her breath with a sigh and a glare at her mirror. Less than a year ago she would never have even given the process of dressing up a second thought. Her few friends never had her dressing in anything more than her uniform, Bruce never asked her to come with him to social events the way he did Dick and Tim. Before Sadie, she didn't dress up for anyone.

"Love does crazy things to a girl," Stephanie had teased. "It makes you stupid. But a great kind of stupid."

"Does it make Tim stupid?" Cassandra asked.

"C'mon. Tim's one of the smartest guys we know. Even Bruce is impressed with him half the time… But I make him _very_ stupid."

"Well, I feel that way now," Cassandra sighed, pulling off the dress and hanging it in her closet, stepping out of the uncomfortable high heels she was wearing. She had hoped the garment, a bright white on top leading to a belt across the stomach and a long black skirt, would feel more comfortable as it was at least a little more reminiscent of her uniform. But she still didn't feel right. It was close enough, she reluctantly decided, and was going to be done trying them on for the night.

She got a look at herself again as she changed into a tank top and a pair of exercise shorts, pulling the small, silver cross necklace out from the inside of her shirt and to the outside. This was her natural state. Short of the uniform, of course.

It would be a long day tomorrow, she remembered, but she wasn't quite ready yet. Grabbing the pillow off her bed, she laid it on the ground, bent down on her knees and began to say her nightly prayers.

A year ago, Cassandra Cain had been Batgirl. She fought against crime and the forces of evil in Gotham, her English was poor and neither thoughts of religion or relationships ever really crossed her mind.

Now, she was The Angel of the Bat, Angel for short, her English was only a little better and God and Sadie were running through her mind constantly.

Two events had run concurrent with her discovery, conversion and life in Catholicism. A maniac in an angelic costume began to preach of Gotham's indecencies and corruption and nearly claimed countless lives in an attempt to incite a pseudo-rapture. And she had met and subsequently become romantically linked to a girl a year older than her named Sadie. The dichotomy of Cassandra's simultaneously realized religious belief and pansexuality had weighed on her in a number of obvious ways. Sadie didn't come to church with her (though she identified as agnostic anyway) and Cassandra didn't openly talk about her in rare conversations with other parishioners. Even Monsignor Ryan, her dear friend and even a keeper of her secret identity, didn't know Sadie existed.

 _God is love_ she continued to remind herself. _God is love_.

No more than a minute or two into her prayer the cell phone sitting on her nightstand began to ring. Cassandra looked for a moment, concluded her latest thought and answered it. "Hello?"

"Hello Cassandra."

"Dad," she replied with a smile.

"I just knew I might not get out to you before you leave town tomorrow," he said. "I wanted to make sure I wished you a safe trip. You know you can call me if anything goes wrong."

"I am only going overnight," Cassandra laughed.

"Still, you're one of mine. I look after you. All of you… Even when you're trouble." His inflection implied that last bit wasn't intended for her.

"I only snapped three fingers! They'll heal! He doesn't deserve it, but they'll heal!"

"Say hello to your sister," Bruce said. The phone went quiet for a few seconds before Bruce said, "Damian says hello."

Cassandra laughed again. "Hello, Damian."

"Call me when you get to Jersey City tomorrow," Bruce instructed. "Don't give me a reason to worry."

"I won't," Cassandra assured him. After a few more words and a wish goodnight, Bruce hung up. With that, Cassandra knelt in front of her bed and resumed praying.

In spite of the struggles, most of it was good. In her faith she found the hope needed to work towards greater ideals than she had ever imagined before. It was easier to smile and laugh than it ever had been before. More than anything else, it made her happy. It was easy to take the bad with the good.

…

The next day at noon, Cassandra arrived at the train station, stepping out of the car driven by Sadie's second cousin Patrick, along with his wife Charlene and Sadie herself. The younger two were still dressed in street clothes while Patrick and Charlene appeared more proper, though their formal attire, like the girls, was in their suitcases.

"Alright, so we'll arrive at about one-thirty," Patrick said, looking down at his watch. "Another fifteen or twenty minutes to the hotel by cab… The park's right across the street but I don't want anything making us late. I want you both to meet us in the lobby at three-fifteen, alright?"

"Will do," Sadie said with a nod.

"And hey listen," he added. "You two have your own room, but no funny business, you understand? We're trusting you."

"What's _really_ going to happen?" Sadie asked, smirking.

"I don't know," Patrick sighed, adjusting his jacket uncomfortably. "Just… Don't do anything… Indecent. Alright? You're still just kids."

"Alright, alright," Sadie said. "Yeesh, did you forget Cassie's Catholic? Her religion invented the chastity belt."

"We all trust Cassandra," Charlene replied. "It's you we're hesitant about."

Cassandra chuckled and shook her head. Patrick and Charlene had been wonderful people since the first day she had met them. After some of the uncomfortable conversations she had Sadie had shared about her mother, it was comforting to know her loved one was now in safe, caring hands.

Sadie had invited Cassandra to a wedding just out of town for another distant relative of hers, part of her urging including, "I don't even know most of these people! I'm going to die of boredom if I don't have someone to play off of."

Cassandra had her own share of hesitations, most particular to her being that she had never attended a wedding before and would have no idea how to act. But Sadie had promised to make it easy for her to follow along, together with the assurance, "Nobody will give us any trouble, by the way. I asked Patrick, they're not exactly old school."

The train arrived on time, the trip was straightforward and uneventful and the four of them took a cab to a 3-star hotel across the street from Smith Park. Sadie all but fell onto one of the big white beds and let out an exacerbated sigh as her suitcase hit the floor. "We have over an hour. I'm not getting up for the first forty-five."

"We're barely an hour from home," Cassandra said, setting down her own duffel bag, a little longer than a normal one, Sadie noted. With that, Cassandra lied down and began to stretch out.

"Aw c'mon. You just gonna leave me over here?" Sadie teased.

"We told your family we would be good," Cassandra replied.

"Yeah yeah yeah, I know we did. But how about this?" Sadie sat up from her bed, took a few steps over to the one where Cassandra was lying and laid down next to her, wrapping her arms around her and coaxed her to lie next to her. "We're just hugging. And we happen to be laying down. That's not anything incriminating, is it?"

Cassandra sighed as she felt her resistance weaken. "Stephanie says you make me act stupid."

"Yeah? You make me feel the same way sometimes." Sadie laid a peck on her forehead. "You make me feel the same way a lot of the time."

The two laid back for about forty-five minutes before Sadie got up to style her short, brown hair a little and change into her bright, blue dress and asking for a hand with the zipper in the back.

"Do I look okay?" She asked, arms raised above her head.

"Great," Cassandra said, blushing a little. "But you always do."

"Aw cut it out," Sadie replied. "We've already got one blusher in the room."

…

The wedding with the Sadie's two relatives took place quickly and smoothly, the girls seated at one of the many white tables surrounding the designated dance square just in front of a gargling fountain as the sun began to set. Cassandra shifted in her seat a little, scratching behind her head as she looked at all the laughing, dancing couples. She looked to Sadie as she took a sip from her glass of water.

"Do you want to dance?"

"I don't think either of us is really the dancing type," Sadie said. "You've told me before you aren't."

"I could tonight," Cassandra said. "If you want to."

Sadie smiled and shook her head before saying, "How about we wait for a different song? Shout is just a little too cheesy for me."

They sat patiently, holding hands a few seconds in. When _Shout_ came to an end, _Celebration_ began to play and Sadie made a face. "Oh man, it just gets worse. I wanna wait on this one too."

Soon _Macarena_ replaced _Celebration_. "Are they trying to kill me here?" Sadie moaned. "I told you this was going to be lame, but _damn_!" Sadie took her hand from Cassandra's and put her face into her palm as _Cha Cha Slide_ began to play. "… You wanna get up for this one?"

"I hate this song," Cassandra said simply.

"Good… Alright, let's make a deal. Next song, so matter how dumb, we get up, okay?"

"Okay."

When the many children in the reception rushed up to the dance floor as the first notes of _The Chicken Dance_ began to play, Sadie looked dead eyed at Cassandra and said, "That one doesn't count. Next one."

"Next one."

Within three minutes, _The Chicken Dance_ came to an end and _My Heart Will Go On_ took its place, Sadie ready to smack her head into the table. "Oh for the love of-"

Only a few measures into the song the stereo was overtaken by a deafening explosion. There came screams and a look of horror from the otherwise unharmed DJ as he slowly pulled himself up from underneath his table.

"Oh thank the heavens! I hate that song!"

As the smoke cleared a man stood amongst the destruction, his hair slicked back and his body shining in a bright, blue luminescent glow. Amongst the screaming and terror, the glowing man took a few steps forward and picked the microphone up off the DJ's table. "Dearly beloved… I'm sorry for interrupting your wedding this evening, but the park is a public place, you know?"

"Who the hell are you?!" A brave man out of the group demanded.

"I'm the guy who just blew up that stereo with my hand! Show some respect, worm!"

Cassandra and Sadie slowly looked up the table's underside, Cassandra biting her lip as she looked back and forth between the blue man and the hotel across the street.

If she hadn't thought something like this would happen, she wouldn't have packed her uniform.

"People of New Jersey, I want to welcome you all to a glorious new age! You were gathered here to see a beautiful couple stand before God… Well here I am! And I'm not alone either!"

This remark dug deep as Cassandra glared at him and turned her attention back towards the hotel. She just had to make a dash for her room on the third floor. As she pushed up Sadie grabbed her shoulder and hissed, "What are you doing?!"

"I need to go," Cassandra said.

"Yeah, so do all of us!" Sadie said, whispering and shouting both at the same time. "Cassandra, I know you're probably pissed about what he just said but-"

Cassandra knelt down and hugged Sadie tight as the bright, blue man continued his speech. "I will be safe. I promise."

"Then what in the world are you-"

"You do the same," Cassandra continued, pulling away and quickly kissing her on the lips before standing up again. "I will see you soon."

Cassandra bent down and unclasped her heels as fast as she could, tossing them aside and running barefoot towards the hotel, only managing a few feet before a blast of lightning singed the grass in front of her. Cassandra stepped back and glared at the source of the attack, a young woman in a black stalking cap, her eyes burning white as electricity rushed over the course of her body.

"Where do you think you're going?" She sneered. "My buddy's giving the speech of a lifetime."

"Leave." Cassandra commanded, hoping against hope she wouldn't trip on her dress if she tried to run.

"I don't think so little girl," Her opponent said mockingly, taking note and raising an eyebrow at the silver cross hanging from Cassandra's neck. "It's a new age. The gods have come down from the heavens and are ready to remind your kind of who's really in charge. The age of the Inhumans starts now!"

With that came three blasts of lightning, all of which Cassandra managed to out-maneuver. She certainly wasn't as fast as the attacks, but her years of studying movement allowed her to predict where the blasts would hit. Her opponent continued, undeterred, entertained even. "Well hey, everybody gets a chance to dance at a wedding, don't they?"

Cassandra said nothing as she rolled out of the way of the latest blast, jumping at the electrical woman with the additional force of her squatted stance and landing a punch right between her eyes. The woman screamed as she was thrown backwards, clutching her face as Cassandra stood up straight again, taking a fighting stance.

"Oh, you're going to regret that!" She screamed. "I'll teach you who-"

Whatever the threat was going to be, she didn't get a chance to make it. Before Cassandra and she could resume their battle, a fist, over three feet wide and four feet tall hit the electrified woman like a brick wall, again knocking her backward. In confusion Cassandra stared at the fist, seeing the arm it was attached to went another four feet back and led to a teenage girl with long black hair, garbed in a bright blue uniform with a lightning bolt running down the center. Cassandra continued to look at her, dumbstruck, as she ran forward, her arm and fist quickly reverting to normal size.

"Hey there, you okay?" The girl asked. Cassandra, after a few seconds of absorbing the sight, nodded. "You might wanna get out of here. These guys look like they mean business."

With that the masked girl ran past Cassandra and towards the crowd. Still confused by exactly what was happening, Cassandra remembered the attack being perpetrated in her midst and resumed her run back toward the hotel. As she did, she could hear the girl issuing a threat against her opponents.

"You guys came to the wrong side of town! Your friendly neighborhood Ms. Marvel is here!"


	2. Chapter 2

And the week had been going so smoothly, too. Jersey City was almost threatening to return to the once boring status it had held for so long. Too far from New York to pick up any blood from the raging superhero fights, too cheerful looking for anyone in Gotham to try and hide out in.

Kamala wasn't even planning on changing into costume. The sun hadn't quite set, her father wouldn't give her any trouble about arriving home late on a Saturday night, the to the bus stop from the mall after the hours laughing and joking with Nakia were going so smoothly. A tiny part of her was asking for this, after the relatively uneventful week, but everything in her regretted it when she first heard that explosion on the opposite side of the hotel she passed.

 _Oh no. Oh no no no no no._ She groaned internally. _People are probably hurt, someone is going something horrible, and I very nearly had Abu trusting me again._

She was in the midst of packing her street clothes into her backpack and digging into a side pouch for her scarf when she started hearing one of the attackers, now just a rush across the street away, ranting about his inhuman ancestry into a microphone. Kamala let out another grown and tapped her head against the hotel's brick wall a few times. "Perfect. As if people didn't have enough reasons to think I'm going to blow stuff up."

Her analysis of the situation was quick- the guy on the stage who looked like a swizzle stick and the girl who was throwing around lightning bolts… and the Asian girl in the dress who was dodging said lightning bolts. That one threw the Kamala-turned-Marvel off. _Wow. Does that mean she's faster than lightning? I mean, no, then she'd be all blurry like that guy the X-Men fight… or is he an X-Man? Was he an Avenger for a while or something? That's not the same guy Crystal used to be married to, is it? That's way too much stuff in one lifetime—_

Ms. Marvel snapped back to reality after she saw the Asian girl deliver a punch, knowing it was only going to further anger the inhuman. The girl was ready to fight, but fancy footwork or not, her odds weren't going to be great against her opponent. It was only right to intervene.

Expanding her fist to the size of a brick wall, Ms. Marvel punched the lightning thrower hard enough to make her scream as she was knocked backwards, allowing her to step between the inhuman and her opponent. "Hey there, are you okay?" The girl gave her a confused look before slowly nodding. "You might want to get out of here. These guys look like they mean business." As the girl too returned to earth, she made a run for the street, crossing it to gain access to the hotel. Ms. Marvel could then return her attention to her opponents, the dirty wedding crashers that they were. "You guys came to the wrong side of town! Your friendly neighborhood Ms. Marvel is here!"

 _Shoot! That was way too wordy! Should have cut the Ms. or something_ , she thought to herself, running towards the electricity powered one as she pushed back to her feet.

"Oh look, guess we have another uninvited guest," Swizzle Stick said from the DJ table. "This outta be good. Hey DJ! You got the theme to the _Mortal Kombat_ movie up here? What? What? No? Come on! That's a great dance number, no matter how hokey it is!"

"Would you stop making such a jackass of yourself up there and give me a hand?!" The electric-powered woman screamed as she resumed firing the blasts of lightning.

 _Do supervillains get memos on this stuff? Why don't I ever get to fight anyone who uses glue as a gimmick?_ Ms. Marvel pondered, dodging out the bursts of lightning to the best of her ability. _I'm rubber you're glue… something something something. No, it always has to be electricity_.

Despite her weakness to electricity, Marvel was still fast on her feet enough to dodge out the lightning woman's attacks, drawing her attack fire away and shouting "Run!" towards the gathered wedding crowd whenever the opportunity seemed to present itself. A handful of the crowd members made a break for the street, but Marvel's opponent only needed to turn and fire another lightning bolt in their direction to end the escape opening of the others.

And sure as luck always seemed to have it, she managed to out-maneuver one of Ms. Marvel's giant fists, grab ahold of it and run a shock through her system. Marvel shouted in pain as she convulsed, her fist first shrinking, then flattening before she pulled tried to jerk it out of the lightning woman's way as she struggled to regain feeling. "That's right!" She shouted. "Not so big now are you? Here comes Kaboom—"

"What the hell?" Swizzle Stick shouted. "Please don't tell me you just made a Nelly reference."

"It's POD, moron!" she shouted back. "How did I ever get stuck with you?"

"… There any Nelly on your computer, DJ? I'm suddenly in the mood."

With a series of electric-powered punches to the face, Kaboom knocked Ms. Marvel to the ground, the current causing her pounding cheeks and lips to sag downward. "Well, what do you think of that?" Kaboom asked. "What are you, someone else who's caught the Terrigan? It's a shame you chose the wrong side. Us and Lineage, we're gonna turn the world upside down." As she spoke, Marvel, still in the process of healing, let out a little chuckle. "What are you laughing about?"

"Let me give you a hand with that!"

Having stopped to make her condescending remark, Marvel had taken the chance to stretch her legs far enough to throw around Kaboom's neck from behind, throwing her forward with enough force to knock her onto her back. As Kaboom shouted, Ms. Marvel got back on her feet, raising her right foot, expanding it to giant size and stomping on Kaboom's stomach, knocking the wind and the fight out of her.

"I get the feeling neither of you were on the guest list," Ms. Marvel said, getting back to her feet as the wounds healed, sighing in her head that a better quip didn't come to her faster. Already she could feel a pang in her stomach from the combat and healing she'd already engaged in and allowed her sight to turn briefly to the wedding cake with only two slices taken out of it on the bride and groom's table. Maybe if she really cleaned house they'd give her some. Or the whole thing, that would work to.

"Alright, I can see more extreme measures are clearly necessary," the man at the DJ table said, sighing as he reached down and grabbed ahold of the shivering, screaming man at his side, begging for mercy. "I don't know if you happened to observe my last display, but the name 'Kaboom' clearly should have been mine. You should back out of here, girl, before I put a lot of Blood on the Dance floor." Threateningly, he raised a single finger toward his captive, as if his touch was all that would be necessary to reduce him to an eruption of blood and gray matter.

He didn't get the chance.

A batarang went soaring through the air, faster than he could observe, collided with his threatening hand, covering it in a dense, viscous green goo. In his demand of " _What?!_ ", the DJ punched him in his glowing face and took off in a sprint for some safer place among the others. Unsure of what had just happened, Ms. Marvel turned to see a shape dressed in white step into the park.

"Batgirl's favorite method. Indirect, but very useful."

Upon closer inspection, Marvel could see only parts of her costume, namely a number of pieces of mostly disconnected armor, were actually white. Her undermost layer was black, with the armor on her chest piece displaying the symbol of a bat, colored in gold with a detailed, stained glass look to it, a white cross etched into its center. Slung over her back was what looked to be a katana. The realization hit Kamala slowly at first, but like a ton of bricks when she pieced it together.

 _Oh my gosh… Oh my gosh oh my gosh oh my gosh! I'm teaming up with one of the Batgirls! I NEVER hear about team ups like this! Did Carol Danvers ever team up with one of the Bat-guys? I think even Spider-Man's only done it once or twice!_

"Thank you for helping," the one in white said, staring down the shimmering man alone at the DJ table. "I am—"

"I know who you are!" Ms. Marvel said. "The Angel of the Bat! I heard you beat up some extremist who was attacking mosques and synagogues and stuff back in Gotham last year."

The Angel didn't give a response vocally, only turning to her and nodding as she took her stance.

"What the hell is one of the bats from Gotham doing here?" Kaboom shouted.

"I'm not getting nearly enough out of these to deal with one of those freaks," the blue man said back. With a clench of his fist, the green goo began to glow until another explosion overtook the stage, freeing his hand as he made a run towards his ally. "Let's get back to the boss and regroup."

Angel drew another few batarangs, but Kaboom, having regained her composure, blew them out of the air with waves of electricity. Her partner bent down, pressing his hands to the dirt until he could throw up another explosion, the two disappearing in the smoke and debris. Angel and Ms. Marvel wheezed as they tried to get a handle on where they had disappeared to, but they were out of sight. Marvel turned to Angel before she did likewise, the latter clearly frustrated. "Hey… come on! We got them to back off this wedding, didn't we?"

"They are still out there… I do not like it, but I should find them. Stop them from attacking anyone else."

"I'll go with you," Ms. Marvel said. "This is my city. But I could definitely use a hand cleaning things up."

"Thank you," Angel said with a sigh. "I leave town and I still find something that needs done… I have family at this wedding, I need to be with them. Out of costume, for now."

"How about we meet up then?" Ms. Marvel said. "There's a convenience store on West Side Avenue, called the Circle Q, I end up around there a lot. We can meet on the roof."

"Why the roof?"

Ms. Marvel double took before turning a little red. "Uh, I just wanted to make you comfortable… you guys in Gotham usually meet up on roofs, don't you?"

"It is hard to grapple in suburban areas," Angel said. "Regardless, I will be there. Thank you for helping me."

"It's an honor!" Kamala stuck out one of her hands and said, "Ms. Marvel, at your service!"

Angel looked down at the hand and then up at her new partner before giving half a smile, taking a hand and saying, "Angel of the Bat, at yours."


End file.
